It was spring on the Manitoba prairies. Kat MacLean (they/she) was a young Toronto actor on tour with a play for young audiences. One day they stepped out of the van and noticed “…the smell of sun hitting grass, snow mold, things melting, things starting to grow… And that’s when I thought, I might need to move back home.” They’re telling me this on a video call from Saskatoon, where they were born and raised. “Creativity lives here different,” they continue. “It feels so good to be back.”
That said, MacLean is a big city lover, self-avowed. “Sometimes, I wish I was a bit more outdoorsy,” she admits. After University she got her acting training at National Theatre School (NTS) in Montreal, where she appreciated the chance to learn directly from working professionals, but especially, loved living in a brand-new city “where I could explore who I was.” She’s recently back from Toronto, where she got to spend precious time with friends, “getting past the catch-up, and then you just talk… That’s my favourite thing.”
MacLean says they’ve always been a bit of a performer. They recall organizing cousins to do lip-sync battles as a child, and pretending to be Rosie O’Donnell, conducting imaginary interviews from the staircase of the family home. “We used to have ‘Joke of the Day’,” they remember. “I was always trying to be really funny with my family.”
When she graduated in 2018, opportunities for Indigenous artists were multiplying. “I don’t think it has ever spiked that high before,” she marvels. She connected with the national Indigenous theatre community, and revelled in bringing her Métis culture and experience to the stage. We agree that things have changed on the national scene somewhat since then. In 2020 the pandemic shut down all live entertainment in Canada for nearly two seasons. In its aftermath, many companies continue to struggle. That may be why some seem more hesitant to present their mostly Settler audiences with too much that’s unfamiliar or untested.
Still, MacLean’s professional trajectory has been remarkable. In 2020, they were cast in the world premiere of Women of the Fur Trade by Frances Koncan at the Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre: a satirical retelling of the story of the Red River Rebellion from the perspective of three women, Ojibwe, Settler, and Métis. The piece is meaningful to MacLean for many reasons, including romantic. In fact they interrupt the interview to dash across the room, pull something off the wall, and hold it up to the screen. It’s a framed photo of them and their partner, whom they met when they were both cast in the production. The keepsake even includes a ticket from that fateful show.
After a hiatus during the pandemic, Fur Trade became a surprise hit, and continues to be produced across the country. MacLean has appeared in two subsequent productions, at the Stratford Festival, “where we had to build in certain references” so Ontario audiences could catch up to the history, and Globe Theatre in Regina, the site of Louis Riel’s execution, “which was very charged.”
The piece still runs through MacLean’s life like a ribbon. She will make her directorial début with it this coming season, at Belfry Theatre in Victoria. “It’s such a prairie story,” she says, pondering how to bring it home to a Vancouver Island audience. “It’s a very present reminder. There will always be this Settler government, saying ‘Just let us do this one thing, just this one little thing,’ — but it’s been happening for centuries. [Through the Treaties,] it’s something that’s been pressed across the whole country, from one end to the other.”
Since childhood, MacLean felt an urge for social justice: “I would be crying at night about the Iraq war,” they say, “those poor children who have no say in this…” Later, performing in Berthold Brecht’s Threepenny Opera introduced them to the idea of theatre as a way to ignite change. If the piece is successful, they remember thinking, “You just leave the theatre and go riot. You take it to the streets.” That view of the arts as political engagement has stuck with them. Theatre is more than just a social occasion, they explain, where you go out afterwards “to have cheesecake and wine… It’s about making you ask, ‘How long has this been going on? What does this mean to our lives?’”
That desire to have an impact is one reason MacLean came home to Saskatoon, where she is Artistic Associate at the Gordon Tootoosis Nīkānīwin Theatre (GTNT), Saskatchewan’s only professional Indigenous theatre company. She’s charged with leading Circle of Voices, a program that introduces primarily Indigenous youth to the many facets of theatre. She credits them as her main inspiration, these days, saying, “They push me to see things in a different way.”
In turn, MacLean encourages the young participants to dream and create beyond the bounds of typical Western or Canadian theatre. “Indigenous Theatre has been telling stories since time immemorial,” they point out, “There’s no reason to follow what Western Theatre does. Not everything has to be a kitchen sink drama. There’s so much space for magic realism, telling things out of time, incorporating many voices…”
Though MacLean is happily ensconced in Saskatoon, she continues to work across the country, and then brings her professional experience right back to the GTNT youth, telling them “this is what I just did, this is what I’m working on,” and encouraging them to see theatre as a real option. “It’s amazing to watch youth spark,” she says.
It’s like the old days at NTS in Montreal, back when MacLean was a student, learning from the pros. Only now, the roles are reversed. They’ve come full circle. “Take what serves you,” they tell the young Indigenous artists, “And leave behind what doesn’t. That’s the Métis way. Braiding everything in.”
Kat MacLean (they/she) is a 2Spirit, Métis-Settler from Treaty 6 Territory & the Homeland of the Métis (Saskatoon, SK). Kat is an actor, storyteller, and the Artistic Associate and Coordinator of the Circle of Voices program at Gordon Tootoosis Nīkānīwin Theatre in Saskatoon. Instagram @katMacLean.
Vanessa Porteous (she/her) is a theatre artist, teaching artist, and writer based in Calgary. From 2018 to 2021 she was Jury Chair for the Siminovitch Prize.
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Top Photo: “The Secret to Good Tea”, Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre (2023). Photo by Dylan Hewlett.